


Oblique

by Butterfly



Category: due South
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2004-04-09
Updated: 2004-04-09
Packaged: 2017-10-26 19:41:30
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,586
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/287138
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Butterfly/pseuds/Butterfly
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Talking about emotions can make guys uncomfortable. Thus says Fraser.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Oblique

**Author's Note:**

> Post-Call of the Wild.

"Ray, was that really necessary?" Benny's voice is, as always, far too calm for the situation that we're in. I meet his eyes and smile a little, wincing as my jaw lets it be known that smiling at all is a stupid idea. Still, he's here, with me, talking to me, which was the point. He didn't go haring off after Stanley, he stayed to talk to his best friend.

It's possible that I'm repressing the part where they did a weird thing with their eyes and that maybe Kowalski is fine with Benny staying. Instead, I will concentrate on the good. "It was, Benny. It was one of the most necessary things that I have ever done."

"You hit Ray," he protested, then he did that thing with his eyebrow and I knew that he was about to be all... forthright, even if it meant that he might be putting his beloved Stanley in a less than pretty light. Not that that was all that hard. That guy's face? I'm guessing it's hard to find any light that's good for it. "Granted, you did have a great deal of provocation, but if you knew him as I do, you would know that Ray often speaks without thinking. A fault that you yourself share, I might add."

"Did you hear what he said?" I said, throwing my hands up in frustration. Benny sighed, somehow indicating with one simple, incredibly annoying breath just how unbearably impossible I was being.

"I can assure you that my hearing hasn't deteriorated in the last six months." He straightened up slightly, which made me notice that he'd been slouching. Fraser had been slouching. Yeah, only so much that he'd looked ex-military instead of on active duty but... the whole world was going insane. That was the only possible answer. "And it isn't as though Ray were lying."

"Do I need to hear this? I'm in a fragile condition." I was also close to actually whining, and seeing Fraser's mouth twitching didn't help. It's that... it's _his_ influence. Benny never would have laughed at me before. Well, not so that it was actually noticable. Unless you were paying attention, which I certainly wasn't. I'm not Frannie. I don't notice these things about people like Benny. "Besides, he hit me back. I'm going to have a bruise on my face on the day of my wedding. Ma will never get over it. _Stella_ will never get over it. I'll be black and blue in my wedding pictures. Years from now, Stella and I will look back at them and my jaw will be swollen."

"Well, perhaps you should have refrained from insulting the size of Ray's weapon," Fraser suggested, his lips definitely lifted up in a smile at my -- his best friend's -- expense. Kowalski corrupted him. It's the only explanation. Benny never used to use innuendo. I didn't know he knew _how_.

"Whose side are you on?" I said, slouching back in my chair. This conversation was not going as planned. Benny just looked at me, eyes practically lighting up the room, like this was a wonderful moment in time.

"Oh, I'm very firmly on my own side," he said, his voice so full of sincerity and warmth that it took me a second to actually catch the words. I could feel my mouth drop open as he continued. "By which I mean to say that I choose not to be on your side in any fight against Ray, and I refuse to be on his side in an argument with you. I'm not going to choose between you."

"You already have!" I said, getting out of the chair so fast that I almost tripped over the table leg. "You went off to Canada with him for six months. You didn't call. You didn't write. You cannot do all that and say that you haven't chosen a side."

My finger waving close to his face didn't seem to put him off at all. That annoying, un-Bennyish smile of his just grew a little more.

"Ray, Ray, Ray -- you are my dearest friend," he said fondly, grabbing my hand right out of the air, which shocked me into silence. He pulled me into a hug and I couldn't help stiffening up. I felt him shake against me and was shocked again when I heard a high-pitched _giggle_. Fraser giggled? Shouldn't I have known this? Hell, Fraser _hugged_? What the hell had happened with tha-- up north? Fraser squeezed me tightly and then pushed me back a little, looking right into my eyes.

Shit. That was Benny all right -- nothing in those baby blues but honesty and kindness. I could feel myself shake my head, but I didn't know if I was saying 'no' to something or just trying to not see what I know I saw. Benny's lips curved into a more familiar smile -- _our_ smile, the warm one that whispered 'best friends'. Fine, I could deal with this weird new Fraser as long as he was still _Benny_.

"I'm still the best friend." I said, forcing it not to be a question.

"Ray, you must know that Ray never took your place in my life," Benny said, his gaze still intent on mine. I could feel the last gasps of my manliness dying as Benny's eyes lightened with affection. "I love Ray, I love him most sincerely and it's unlike anything I've ever felt, but that doesn't change my friendship with you."

"Fraser, do we have to?" I complained, doing my best to act like this 'sharing feelings' thing was the worst thing that he could ever do to me. It wasn't too hard, because it did make me pretty damn uncomfortable. But Benny seemed to want to do that emotional thing, and it always was hard to say no to him. And seeing him smile that way was worth a little discomfort. Not that I would ever say that.

Benny looked me over, but kinda distantly, like he was seeing something that wasn't there. Or someone. "I believe that we do. My relationship with Ray has taught me that some things need to be said at least once. After that, it's safe to let them be, but vocalization is important, even if it isn't something that you enjoy saying or knowing."

"Okay, then, Benny," I said, finally giving in. "Tell me."

"The first person that I loved as an adult was Victoria," he said, after a brief pause. He licked his lower lip quickly, pulling away from me, turning away from me, taking away his eyes. "You know better than anyone how that... crumbled." So I couldn't see his face anymore, not straight-on, but I could see him tense up while he was talking, his spine hardening further back into steel. "I had, for a time, hoped that I could find something lasting with Inspector Thatcher, but looking back, I can see that it was doomed from the start. She could never have belonged in the tundra. She didn't want to. And I..."

He let out a soft breath, and I almost reached out to touch his shoulder. He rocked in place, his hands locking back into parade rest or whatever the hell it was. "You were gone. I felt... confused, because in your place was this... will'o'wisp, pulling me away from everything I thought I'd known." Benny turned his head slightly and I could see his profile now -- face tight with some emotion that I couldn't recognize. Something that didn't fit on his face. "Oh, Ray, it was so horribly disorienting. I had lost you, and here was a man who claimed to be you, who I knew could not be you, yet was someone who called to me."

His face relaxed, that unfamiliar smile on the corner of his mouth again. His voice had lowered, and I'd never heard him sound that way before. "I believe in love at first sight. I must, because I fell in love at the moment that I saw his face. He turned towards me, said my name, and gave me a hug that I..." Benny's head lowered again, and I couldn't see his face anymore. "Ray has every right to -- everything he said is true."

"Benny..." I try to find words, I do, but even though I can listen to this, I can let him say these things, I just can't say anything like it back. I just don't have the words and I don't have the guts.

He turns back to me now, and his face is solemn. It feels like a good-bye, even though he'd said that he would be at the wedding tomorrow. "Ray, you will always be my dearest friend. You... and Stella, of course, are welcome to come see me in Canada anytime that you wish. But when you do come, Ray will be there."

"I know, Benny." In the end, there really wasn't anything else to say. He and I both knew that Stella wouldn't ever go up there. And, in a way, this was a good-bye. It's a good-bye to being Benny's partner, which I don't know if I ever really was, now. How does Benton Fraser define partners? I thought I knew, once.

I smile at him, I watch him walk away, and I know where he's going. And I know that I won't see him tomorrow. Choosing his own side, huh?

Maybe, when my jaw stops hurting, I'll visit him.

As a friend.

  
_the end_   



End file.
